However, the ACEEE report, The Size of the U.S. Energy Efficiency Market: Generating a More Complete Picture, concludes that "…our nation is not aware of the role that energy efficiency has played in satisfying our growing energy-service demands…the contributions of efficiency often go unrecognized. The contributions of energy efficiency often remain invisible..." The report also notes that although efficiency is a proven resource, it remains underdeveloped. "In short, the evidence suggests that efficiency can make an even larger contribution towards stabilizing energy prices and reducing greenhouse gas emissions – should we choose to fully develop it."
The ACEEE report was prepared with major support from the Civil Society Institute (CSI). Additional support was provided by the Kendall Foundation and the North American Insulation Manufacturers Association.
Key report findings include:
Given the right choices and investments in the many cost-effective but underutilized energy efficiency technologies, the United States can cost-effectively reduce energy consumption by an additional 25-30% or more over the course of the next 20-25 years.
Annual investments in energy efficiency technologies currently support 1.6 million U.S. jobs. The $300 billion invested in energy efficiency in 2004 was three times the amount invested in traditional energy infrastructure.
Investments in energy efficiency technologies are estimated to have generated approximately 1.7 quads of energy savings in 2004 alone – roughly the equivalent of the energy required to operate 40 mid-sized coal-fired or nuclear power plants.
Since 1970, energy efficiency has met about three-fourths of the demand for new energy-related services while conventional energy supply has covered only one-fourth of this demand.
Total investments in more energy efficiency technologies could increase the annual energy efficiency market by nearly $400 billion by 2030, resulting in an annual efficiency market of more than $700 billion – and total additional investments over the period 2008-2030 of nearly $7 trillion. More at: http://aceee.org/press/e083pr.htm
The money is funneled through non-profit groups controlled by the coal industry, such as the Kentucky Foundation, which is run out of the Lexington office of the Kentucky Coal Association and led by Bill Caylor, the association's president, according to tax and corporate records.
The money is used largely for statewide classroom programs designed "to carry a positive message about the coal industry," according to records. A Web site with teaching materials and games describes mountaintop removal mining as "simply the right thing to do Ð both for the environment and for the local economy Ð a true win-win."
State officials ordered the Web site's content altered to sound more neutral this week after the Herald-Leader asked about it.
Gov. Steve Beshear and a legislative committee have approved adding $17,500 to this year's $100,000 contract for the Kentucky Foundation so it can conduct a study showing the economic benefits of coal mining to the state. A retired University of Kentucky economist will be hired for the task, Caylor said.
"The environmentalists throw out a lot of negative stuff, like kids who are suffering from asthma because they breathe particulate matter from living near a coal-fired power plant, or deaths caused on the roads by big coal trucks," Caylor said. "We're trying to counteract that."
Some of those environmentalists said they were shocked to hear that tax money is used this way, especially as education, health and public safety programs are cut. Let the coal industry pay for its own public relations, they said.
"The state should not be in the business of promoting propaganda for the coal industry," said Dave Cooper, chairman of the Bluegrass Group of the Sierra Club. "I drive around the country with a slide show to educate people about the damage caused by mountaintop removal mining. Funny, but I receive no government funding for my work at all." (MORE) Go to Original
Another health malady linked to fine particles
May 15, 2008-Ed Edelson in the Washington Post. Fine particles are known to cause cancer, heart disease, stroke and respiriatory problems like asthma. Now comes a new disease-blood clots in people's legs. Fine particles are formed when pollutants like sulfur dioxide from coal burning combine with oxygen to form a particle which is breathed deeply into human lungs.
Long-term exposure to the tiny, dirty particles in polluted air seems to increase the risk of deep vein thrombosis, which are blood clots in the thighs or legs, an Italian study finds.
"It is well-established that air pollution causes myocardial infarction [heart attack] and stroke," said Dr. Andrea Baccarelli, who led the study while at the Harvard School of Public Health. "This is the first time that anyone has connected air pollution with deep vein thrombosis."
Previous studies have suggested such a connection, said Baccarelli, who is now an assistant professor of environmental health at the University of Milan. "Several studies in animal models and in humans have shown that particulate matter, inhaled into the lungs, causes inflammation in the lungs," he said. "The inflammation can expand the cell body, so that the incidence of coagulation is increased."
Coagulation is the formation of clots that can block blood vessels.
Baccarelli and his colleagues assessed the effect of air polluted with particulate matter smaller than 10 micrometers in diameter -- about one-40th the width of a human hair. Such particles come from the exhaust of vehicles, especially those with diesel engines, and burning of fossil fuels, the researchers said.
The scientists compared the exposure to such pollution on 870 residents of the Lombardy region of Italy who had been diagnosed with deep vein thrombosis, and 1,210 residents who did not have deep vein thrombosis. The researchers used the average concentration of particulate matter measured by monitors at 53 sites.
Compensating for other environmental and health factors, the researchers found that the risk of deep vein thrombosis increased by 70 percent for every increase in particulate matter of 10 micrograms per square meter. Tests showed that the blood of people more exposed to such pollution took less time to form clots. (MORE) Go to Original
First Bee shows up. Check out that pollen on its leg.
VW president, John Blair speaks at Vectren Annual Meeting
May 14, 2008-John Blair owns a single share of Vectren stock just to get their annual report and occasionally attend their annual meeting. He did that today. Here is his story. Blair is pictured in a file photo on the Ohio River with Vectren in the background on the left.
I just attended the Vectren annual meeting and found it really interesting not for what was said but mainly for what was omitted.
After the election of directors, Niel Ellerbrook gave a presentation regarding the future of the country and the future of Vectren.
As you may recall, Vectren dropped out of the Duke Edwardsport proposal well in advance of its being granted the go ahead by the IURC. Shortly before that critical decision, Vectren also purchased 30 MW of wind power from the Orion Wind Farm in Benton County, IN which is due to come online shortly.
What was important in today's meeting was the fact that not a single word was mentioned by Mr. Ellerbrook regarding the proposed Indiana Gasification LLC project slated for either Rockport of Sullivan, Indiana which is supposed to turn Indiana coal into pipeline quality gas.
Although Ellerbrook did say they were seeking additional gas supplies at a time when prices were moving higher to serve their gas customers throughout Indiana and Ohio, he did not say a word about IGLLC being even part of the solution to their effort.
Valley Watch and the Citizens Action Coalition are both intervening to stop IGLLC from progressing to construction on this plant because we feel that it will be a major hit against ratepayers of both Vectren and NISource. There has been no official declaration by IGLLC as to the cost of construction since Governor Mitch Daniels announced the project in 2005 at a price of $1 billion.
We can only speculate that this is more Mitch Daniels' project than it is Vectren's or NiSource and that Daniels is merely using them as pawns to make the promoters of IGLLC rich of the backs of Hoosier ratepayers.
Since Edwardsport has gone up a 135% since that time, IGLLC presents essentially the same financial issues of Edwardsport and other new coal plants proposed and canceled around the country.
One reason there is a perceived need for the IGLLC to boost gas supplies is the construction of the largest Ethanol facility in the US (226,000,000 Gallons per year) in the Vectren South service territory. Last Summer, Ellerbrook stated in the Energy Summit of Southwest Indiana, held in Evansville last August 31 that the two ethanol plants proposed for this region (only one is currently under construction although the other is permitted) would increase their South Division natural gas demand by more than 60%. I am still reeling over that figure and how ethanol can be an efficient energy source but I digress.
Frankly, I found the whole meeting to show, at least to some extent a definite movement toward a new energy future for Vectren. And that is welcome news, indeed.
In any case, the whole meeting can accessed via the web at the link below.
May 11, 2008-By Bill McKibben in the Los Angeles Times. The planet is nearing a tipping point on climate change, and it gets much worse, fast. We have, at best, a few years to short-circuit them -- to reverse course. Bill McKibben, a scholar in residence at Middlebury College and the author A longer version of this article appears at Tomdispatch.com.
Even for Americans -- who are constitutionally convinced that there will always be a second act, and a third, and a do-over after that, and, if necessary, a little public repentance and forgiveness and a Brand New Start -- even for us, the world looks a little terminal right now.
It's not just the economy: We've gone through swoons before. It's that gas at $4 a gallon means we're running out, at least of the cheap stuff that built our sprawling society. It's that when we try to turn corn into gas, it helps send the price of a loaf of bread shooting upward and helps ignite food riots on three continents. It's that everything is so tied together. It's that, all of a sudden, those grim Club of Rome types who, way back in the 1970s, went on and on about the "limits to growth" suddenly seem ... how best to put it, right.
All of a sudden it isn't morning in America, it's dusk on planet Earth.
There's a number -- a new number -- that makes this point most powerfully. It may now be the most important number on Earth: 350. As in parts per million of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
A few weeks ago, NASA's chief climatologist, James Hansen, submitted a paper to Science magazine with several coauthors. The abstract attached to it argued -- and I have never read stronger language in a scientific paper -- that "if humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on Earth is adapted, paleoclimate evidence and ongoing climate change suggest that CO2 will need to be reduced from its current 385 ppm to at most 350 ppm."
Hansen cites six irreversible tipping points -- massive sea level rise and huge changes in rainfall patterns, among them -- that we'll pass if we don't get back down to 350 soon; and the first of them, judging by last summer's insane melt of Arctic ice, may already be behind us. (MORE) Go to Original
CCS-Grasping at straws in the climate debate
May, 9, 2008-Science Daily. Globally, a total of some millions of tons per year is being stored today within the framework of CCS. But to live up to the hopes placed on CCS requires the storage of several billion tons. In other words, this involves gargantuan volumes. In fact, carbon dioxide would be the world’s largest transported good.
Great hopes are being placed on undeveloped technology. Capturing and storing carbon dioxide is predicted to be one of the most important measures to counter the threats to our climate. But the technology still hasn’t been tested in full scale, and the complications and risks it entails may have been grossly underestimated.
This is the conclusion drawn in Anders Hansson’s dissertation at the Department of Technology and Social Change, Linköping University, in Sweden. He studied documents from the EU and the UN Climate Panel about CCS (Carbon dioxide Capture and Storing), as well as some of the research they are based on. The UN Climate Panel released its most thoroughly considered report ever last year, supported by an uncommonly unanimous research community.
The Climate Panel sees CCS as offering great potential. In various scenarios it accounts for between 15 and 55 percent of the reduction of greenhouse gases by 2100. The EU also is promoting CCS, suggesting that it be included in the trading of emission rights, for example. Carbon dioxide that is captured in energy production, for example, and is placed in long-term storage in the crust of the earth would thus be counted as never having been produced, according to the EU proposal. The consequence is that coal power, which is the biggest area of application for CCS, is being called sustainable coal and is equated in many respects with renewable energy. (MORE) Go to Original
Pity poor coal promoters who whine about Sierra Club mercury lawsuits
May, 9, 2008-By John Blair, valleywatch.net eidtor. Spendiing millions on national advertising to promote coal with generally false claims of cleanliness, the American Coalition for - Coal Electricity issued a press release yesterday complaining that Sierra Club and its "cohorts" were simply "clogging up the system" by suing numerous coal fired plant proposals to decrease mercury emissions.
ACCCE's press release sounded a bit like the rant of a spoiled brat as they accused Sierra Club of "falsely portraying itself as favoring Maximum Achievable Control Technology (MACT) standards" in its recently announced suits against plants that were not in compliance with hazardous pollutant rules under the Clean Air Act.
Instead, ACCCE blames Sierra is against all coal saying, "Simply put, they are opposed to the construction of coal-fueled power plants, period."
ACCCE and it predecessor, American for Balanced Energy Choices, make that Americans for Coal have spent millions of coal funded dollars over the last few years to advertise the virtues of coal, often using false claims and even a choking eagle to say that coal is now clean and safe to use.
Last year, ABEC used cute kids to talk of the wonderful future coal use would yield if only we would allow new coal technology to be paid for with federal subsidies.
ACCCE likes to emphasize the fact that the US relies on coal today and thus must rely on coal in the future if we want to keep the lights on.
ABEC and ACCCE also spend million on lobbying both states and the federal government, using phone banks and direct mail to give the appearance of grassroots support for coal where it doesn't always exist.
A few years ago, Sierra Club did make a conscious decision to oppose numerous new coal plants, first in the midwest, then across the nation.
They have coalesced with regional groups like Valley Watch and The American Bottom Conservancy to carefully scrutinize environmental permits and challenge them in courts and administrative proceedings in several states.
Since their involvement, they have been successful in stopping numerous plants outright or forced settlements with increased use of renewables and efficiency and large reductions in CO2.
Valley Watch has worked with Sierra Club both nationally and throughout the midwest to stop additional coal plants from being built at least until the economic and environmental veracity of capturing and storing carbon has been proven.
IDEM dodges questions on BP air permit
May 9, 2008-By Gitte Laasby, Gary Post-Tribune. Asked whether Stuckey checked with legal counsel on the notice requirement, Easterly said, "I can't speak for what somebody else did." Ed. Note: Tom Easterly is the Commissioner, is he not accountable for the actions of his agency?
The Indiana Department of Environmental Management refuses to answer certain questions about the timing of a public hearing on BP's air permit.
Among them: Who at IDEM was responsible for ignoring state law and providing inadequate notice of the hearing?
As the Post-Tribune revealed in April, IDEM's chief of the permits branch of the Office of Air Quality, Matt Stuckey, e-mailed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in January to ask how long was the required notice. He was told state law applies.
State law specifies it's 30 days, but IDEM scheduled a hearing with 18 to 20 days notice.
Now IDEM won't say who at the agency made the call to ignore state law.
The Post-Tribune asked IDEM three times whether Stuckey or anybody else from IDEM looked up state requirements.
Another question was whether Stuckey informed his superiors of the response he received from the EPA and, if so, who made the decision to schedule the hearing with too little notice anyway.
Each time, IDEM sent back a similar answer. (MORE) Go to Original
Kentucky seeks to subsidize coal to diesel plant in Muhlenberg County
May 7, 2008-by Stephanie Steitzer, in the Louisville Courier Journal. Ed. Note: Kentucky is ga ga over coal and the problem with global warming has no brief in the Commonwealth as politicians from all ranks jump on the chance to spend taxpayer money on anything that can be called coal.
A Louisville corporation has announced plans to build a $200 million coal-to-diesel plant in Muhlenberg County.
Kentucky Fuel Associates Inc. could receive up to $2.5 million in grant money from the state to build the plant, which would produce 200 million gallons of diesel fuel a year, said Robert Christensen, the company's executive vice president.
Kentucky Fuel Associates is partnering with Fuel Frontiers Inc., a subsidiary of Washington, D.C.-based Nuclear Solutions Inc., to build the plant, Christensen said.
The plant would use 500,000 tons of Kentucky coal a year and employ 200 workers, according to a release from Kentucky Fuel Associates.
In the 2008-10 budget passed by the legislature last month, $625,000 in coal severance tax money was allocated for the project. The budget also stipulated that the company would not receive that money if it qualifies for a different grant under the energy bill passed by the General Assembly last summer.
Kris Kimel, president of the Kentucky Science and Technology Corp., which administers a $5 million entrepreneurial pool established by the energy bill, said the company has applied for $2.5 million for the Muhlenberg plant, as well as another $2.5 million for a possible second plant.
The second plant also would be in Western Kentucky, though a specific site has not been chosen.
Kimel said the proposals are under review and a decision could be made later this month.
Christensen said construction could begin 90 days later and take up to 20 months to complete.
He said the company ultimately wants to build five plants in Kentucky, producing a billion gallons of diesel fuel a year.
As the Amundsen cuts through ice across the top of the globe, Carrie and his fellow researchers are uncovering evidence of a disturbing fallout of climate change. They are finding toxic contaminants, some at remarkably high levels, accumulating in this remote and visually pristine environment. Although there are no industrial sources in the Arctic, residents of the Far North have some of the world's highest levels of mercury exposure, some well above what the World Health Organization considers safe. High levels of mercury -- a powerful neurotoxin -- are being found in Arctic marine wildlife, including ringed seals and beluga whales, both staples of the traditional Northern diet. Levels in Arctic beluga have increased markedly in recent years.
When coal is burned in power plants in the U.S., China and elsewhere, mercury is released into the atmosphere. Airborne, mercury can travel great distances before settling to the ground, or into lakes, rivers and oceans. Air and ocean currents, propelled by weather patterns and storm systems, sweep the mercury north. But the recent increases in Arctic mercury outpace and cannot be explained by smokestack emissions alone, says Gary A. Stern, a senior scientist with Canada's Department of Fisheries and Oceans, professor at the University of Manitoba and co-leader of the Amundsen expedition. Rather, signs point to global warming and other disruptive impacts of climate change. (MORE) Go to Original
Update: Region 5 EPA Administrator fired for doing her job
On Thursday, following months of internal bickering over Mary Gade's interactions with Dow, the administration forced her to quit as head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Midwest office, based in Chicago.
Gade told the Tribune she resigned after two aides to national EPA administrator Stephen Johnson took away her powers as regional administrator and told her to quit or be fired by June 1.
The call came as the Tribune was preparing to publish a story about the dioxin issue and Gade's crusade.
Jonathan Shradar, an EPA spokesman in Washington, said Gade has been placed on administrative leave until June 1. He declined further comment, saying the agency does not publicly discuss personnel matters.
Gade has been locked in a heated dispute with Dow about long-delayed plans to clean up dioxin-saturated soil and sediment that extends 50 miles beyond its Midland, Mich., plant into Saginaw Bay and Lake Huron. The company dumped the highly toxic and persistent chemical into local rivers for most of the last century.Dow resisted taking steps needed to protect human health and wildlife. (MORE) Go to Original
Hallelujah! Indiana wind farm goes online
April 30, 2008-by John Blair Valley Watch editor. Renewable energy has been our mantra for several decades at Valley Watch. This week, Orion Energy Group put about half of their planned 121 wind turbines online. The rest will be operational soon. Photo for valleywatch.net by Alice Wernicki
The entire project is supposed to be 130 megawatts when complete. 100 of those megawatts has been sold to Duke Energy and 30 to Vectren.
Vectren customers will soon be able to purchase this green energy by paying a surcharge of $2.50 per each 100 kilowatt hours they wish to purchase.
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory estimates that Indiana has wind energy potential of more than 40,000 megawatts. Today, most of Indiana's electric power comes from 26,000 megawatts of installed coal capacity.
Newly discovered tree considered "oldest in the world"
April 29, 2008-BBC News. A tree said to be the oldest on the planet - thought to be nearly 10,000 years old - has been found in Sweden. It took seed just after the last Ice Age.
Scientists from Umeaa University discovered the spruce on Fulu Mountain in Dalarna province while carrying out a census of tree species there in 2004.
The age of its genetic material was recently calculated using carbon dating at a laboratory in Miami, Florida.
Scientists had believed the world's oldest trees were 4,000-year-old pine trees found in North America. The oldest, a bristlecone pine named Methuselah located in California's White Mountains, is aged 4,768, according to the Guinness Book of World Records.
The new record contender, which would have taken root just after the last ice age, was found among a cluster of around 20 spruces believed to be more than 8,000 years old at an altitude of 910m (2,985ft) on Fulu Mountain.
The visible portion of the spruce was comparatively new, but analysis of four "generations" of remains - cones and wood - found underneath its crown showed its root system had been growing for 9,550 years, Umeaa University said.
James Hansen on the State of the Wild and Tipping Points
April 28, 2008- By James Hansen, director of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Goddard Institute for Space Studies, but the perspectives here are his own. Hansen is also Adjunct Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia University’s Earth Institute. Photo from State of the Wild by Alexander Hafemann
“Animals are on the run. Plants are migrating too.” I wrote those words in 2006 to draw attention to the fact that climate change was already under way. People do not notice climate change because it is masked by day-to-day weather fluctuations, and we reside in comfortable homes.
Animals and plants, on the other hand, can survive only within certain climatic conditions, which are now changing. The National Arbor Day Foundation had to redraw its maps for the zones in which tree species can survive, and animals are shifting to new habitats as well.
Are these gradual changes in the wild consistent with dramatic scientific assessments of a crystallizing planetary emergency? Unfortunately, yes. Present examples only hint at the scale of the planetary emergency that climate studies reveal with increasing clarity.
Our home planet is dangerously near a tipping point at which human-made greenhouse gases reach a level where major climate changes can proceed mostly under their own momentum. Warming will shift climatic zones by intensifying the hydrologic cycle, affecting freshwater availability and human health. We will see repeated coastal tragedies associated with storms and continuously rising sea levels.
The implications are profound, and the only resolution is for humans to move to a fundamentally different energy pathway within a decade. Otherwise, it will be too late for one-third of the world’s animal and plant species and millions of the most vulnerable members of our own species.
We may be able to preserve the remarkable planet on which civilization developed, but it will not be easy: special interests are resistant to change and have inordinate power in our governments, especially in the United States. Understanding the nature and causes of climate change is essential to crafting solutions to our current crisis. (Download entire article below as a PDF)
March has warmest global land temperatures on record
April 28, 2008-Last month was the warmest March on land globally in the 129 history of record keeping according to NOAA's Satellite and Information Center released several days ago. Combined with ocean surface temperatures, march ranked second on record.
The average global temperature (land and ocean surface combined) for last month was the 2nd warmest on record for March, while the average temperature for the contiguous U.S. was near average (ranking the 63rd warmest), according to an analysis by NOAA's National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.
The global surface (land and ocean surface) temperature was the 2nd warmest on record for March in the 129-year record, 1.28° F (0.71° C) above the 20th century mean of 54.9° F (12.7° C). The warmest March on record (+1.33° F/0.74° C) occurred in 2002.
The global land surface temperature was the warmest on record for March, 3.3° F (1.8° C) above the 20th century mean of 40.8° F (5.0° C). Temperatures more than 8° F above average covered much of the Asian continent. Two months after the greatest January snow cover extent on record on the Eurasian continent, the unusually warm temperatures led to rapid snow melt, and March snow cover extent on the Eurasian continent was the lowest on record.
Although the ocean surface average was only the 13th warmest on record, as the cooling influence of La Niña in the tropical Pacific continued, much warmer than average conditions across large parts of Eurasia helped push the global average to a near record high for March.
Northern Hemisphere snow cover extent was the fourth lowest on record for March, remaining consistent with boreal spring conditions of the past two decades, in which warming temperatures have contributed to anomalously low snow cover extent.
Some weakening of La Niña, the cold phase of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, occurred in March, but moderate La Niña conditions remained across the tropical Pacific Ocean. (MORE) Go to Original
Iowa Medical Society pans coal-calls for efficiency and renewable energy
April 24, 2008-by Dr. Maureen McCue in the Des Moines Register
On Sunday, the Iowa Medical Society, which represents more than 4,600 physicians in Iowa, passed a resolution supporting "policies that encourage and require investment in energy efficiency, conservation, and renewable energy" and "clean and safe energy with the least detrimental impacts upon the public's health."
The Des Moines Register editorial board made much the same arguments Sunday in opining that "building a coal-fired plant in Marshalltown is not now the right course for Iowa." Advertisement
Iowans' health will benefit from decision makers listening to that advice, particularly the health of our most vulnerable communities: infants and the young, pregnant mothers and the elderly. We do not need the additional health threats posed by new coal plants. Instead, we need to support economic growth and lower energy costs through energy efficiency and clean, safe energy.
Each proposed coal plant would likely emit around 100 pounds of mercury a year, much of which would end up in our lakes and streams, and eventually, our bodies. The Environmental Protection Agency states that "on balance, mercury from coal-fired utilities is the hazardous air pollutant of greatest potential public-health concern."
In expressing their concern about coal-fired power plants, Texas' Catholic bishops noted that mercury poses a particular risk to "unborn life." Thousands of women of child-bearing age have elevated levels of toxic mercury in their blood, which could lead to reduced IQ and neurologic impairment in their children.
Many of Iowa's waterways, including parts of the Cedar, Upper Iowa and Mississippi rivers have fish-consumption advisories warning Iowans not to eat more than one meal a week because of elevated mercury levels. The Idaho governor, a Republican, banned coal plants in his state because "the health implications of mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants far outweigh any economic benefits."
Another major concern: climate change. Dr. Howard Frumkin, director of the Center for Disease Control's National Center for Environmental Health, calls climate change "perhaps the largest looming public health challenge we face." From intense heat waves and more severe weather-related disasters to increases in the range and number of insect pests and disease vectors like mosquitoes, global warming will add to rising health costs.
Coal-fired power is a major source of climate-affecting pollutants. The Florida Medical Association encouraged the state's governor to adopt improved energy-efficiency standards before approving new coal plants. The Florida governor, a Republican, subsequently opposed new coal plants, which were dropped from consideration in favor of efficiency and renewable energy.
The EPA's own scientific advisory board, the American Medical Association, the American Lung Association and other health organizations have challenged current air-quality standards, such as those for fine-particulate matter, as insufficient to protect public health. Coal plants, which contribute to ozone and smog, are responsible for hundreds of premature deaths a year, increasing asthma hospitalizations, other respiratory ailments and cardiac disease. (MORE) Go to Original
Obama misses big opportunity to show his green side in Evansville
For months, I have watched Barack Obama excite crowds with his message of hope. And, I will admit that I, too, have felt inspiration seeing thousands of young people react to Obama as if he were that singular leader who will carry American forward to retrieve its rightful place in a world that is burdened with everything from food shortage, escalating energy prices and war.
Eight years of George Bush has created an environment that shouts out for change and Obama’s message of hope touches a nerve in people faced with economic hardship and calamity.
With those positive feelings, I ventured to the Obama speech in Evansville (IN) last night (4/22). For more than a year, I’ve quelled my concerns with many policies Obama has embraced, opting to take friends’ and colleagues’ advice that he is the only candidate that will bring change that I agreed is needed.
I was particularly thrilled that I would get to see Obama on Earth Day. He has oft acknowledged the planetary carbon crisis and he was coming to the town that is the center of the largest concentration of coal fired capacity in the world. Rarely, are politicians given such wonderful opportunities to speak directly to such issues to a national audience.
But, Obama was mum on the environment and everything else that could have been discussed on Earth Day. Oh, he did mention renewable energy and a “planet in peril.” I had heard him say those things a thousand times.
Did he even know it was Earth Day?
His speech was identical to the one he has made in nearly every other state after a loss except that this time he delivered it without passion as if he were tired and disillusioned. And even missing the great opportunity that Earth Day presented, he said little about anything except hope, making me hope that he would give me something new to digest for having had to wait for close to three hours to hear him.
I tried to dismiss the lack of an Earth Day message as a personal bias on my part. But what I failed to understand why his handlers had failed to even recognize that it was Earth Day.
More than a week ago, I sought to inform the Obama campaign about the marvelous honor that some kids from Mater Dei High School in Evansville had earned for building the best high mileage vehicle ever designed. A team of aspiring young engineers drove away as winners in the competition against numerous university teams for a vehicle that achieved a phenomenal 2,843 miles per gallon in a contest in California.
That was before his campaign had decided to come to Evansville on Earth Day or any other day. With Earth Day, however, it seemed a perfect way for Obama to recognize these enterprising youth as examples of the “change that we can believe in.”
Either, my efforts to inform the Obama campaign failed or else they simply were not interested perhaps a mixture of both.
But it was not until today I found just how insensitive the Obama camp is to issues pertaining to our perilous planet.
Apparently Obama flies around in a Boeing 757. He has business to conduct and there is no fault in using such a plane to get from here to there with an entourage of staff and reporters in tow.
However, I was told today by an air traffic controller at the Evansville tower that they were informed by the plane’s crew that they would leave the engines running during his stay in Evansville so that a quick exit could be made.
The 757 has two rather large jet engines and frankly I have no idea how much fuel would be consumed at idle over the approximately two hours the plane was on the ground in Evansville. The amount is irrelevant. What is relevant is the total lack of understanding his campaign shows toward wasteful use of energy by keeping the plane running on the ground when it is not needed.
If Obama has not instructed his staff to eliminate ALL waste of energy during his campaign, what are the implications for an Obama presidency when it comes to a planet in peril?
Wasting energy is something that must stop immediately if we are to ever get a handle on climate change or any other energy problem we face. And, that means turning off engines of all sorts when they are not in use.
Some may say that I am being overly sensitive to these issues, that I should lighten up on this guy or anyone else who chooses waste instead of conservation. There is one word for that-BUNK.
But what concerns me more than anything is Obama’s failure to capitalize on what has become an international effort to draw attention to the environment - Earth Day.
Instead of trying to keep a smiley face on his big loss in Pennsylvania, acting like it did not matter that his candidacy is on the ropes, Obama could have diverted attention away from the Clinton Pennsylvania win with a strong Earth Day statement during his appearance in Evansville.
He needn’t even discuss global warming, coal or anything so contentious. He could have thrown out softballs, nearly anything that would have made him look green. It was Earth Day after all. His failure to even mention the day in his Evansville speech says volumes about his true concern for the serious issues facing our planet.
Politically, he could have changed the entire dialogue from being defeated in yet another big state to just how valid are the proposals he was making to save the planet. Sure some of the pundits would insist on keeping the issue purely political but others are full of hope that some day, he will set forth some real issues on which to base the hope and the change we can truly believe in.
Opportunities like those presented last night in Evansville do not occur very often and frankly he blew this one big time. On Earth Day, instead of planting seeds for a green revolution, he left his engines running on the tarmac.
John Blair is a Pulitzer Prize winning photographer who serves as president of the environmental health advocacy group Valley Watch in Evansville, IN
IDEM no longer informs public on climate change/warming issues
April 22, 2008-by Gitte Laasby, The Gary Post Tribune. Ed. Note: IDEM has become nothing more than an economic development agency for Indiana, moving rapidly to issue permits without due vetting and now even to the point that they will not inform people of the biggest environmental issue of our time.
Over the past few years, the Indiana Department of Environmental Management hasn't just rebuffed the idea of monitoring carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases.
The agency has dramatically decreased its information about global warming and greenhouse gases.
IDEM used to emphasize the importance of global warming and its impact on Indiana in its annual "State of the Environment" reports.
But the multiple references to terms such as "global warming" and "greenhouse gases" are down to a minimum. The annual reports are no longer published and the agency's Northwest Indiana regional office in Merrillville does not have any materials on global warming.
While other states, such as Michigan, have lesson plans for students on the issue on their Web site, there's hardly any information on the issue on IDEM's Web site. Even the agency's educational materials contain only a single reference to global warming.
"We don't really have anything on our Web site," IDEM spokesman Rob Elstro confirmed Monday.
By contrast, IDEM's annual reports in 1998, 1999 and 2001 had full pages addressing global warming and its potential effects on Indiana.
"Greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, such as carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and chlorofluorocarbons, trap the heat of the earth and are thought by many scientists to be the cause of rising global temperatures. Global warming could change rain and temperature patterns and affect Indiana's agriculture and quality of life," IDEM's 2001 report stated.
IDEM Assistant Commissioner of the Office of Air Quality Dan Murray recently said IDEM has no legal authority to regulate greenhouse gases in permits and he wasn't sure whether IDEM would support a federal greenhouse gas control program.
"We have to see what a federal program would look like," Murray said in an interview, "but to speculate on that today would be purely speculation." Go to Original
April 15, 2008-Editorial, Gary Post Tribune. Ed. Note: Gary is in extreme northwest Indiana but the same things this editorial point out are happening in SW indiana as well. Public participation is squelched, and citizens are treated as the enemy. It's enough to make you scream.
Gov. Mitch Daniels brought some well-learned Washington, D.C., lessons home to Indiana and applied them to the Indiana Department of Environmental Management.
The once nonpolitical department is politicized, and IDEM officials' idea of public records is "it's not public unless we say so."
IDEM Commissioner Tom Easterly acquiesced Friday, releasing the state's list of impaired waters. Previously, his underlings refused to release not just the list but also the state reaction to public comments.
The list of impaired waters contains rivers, streams and lakes considered contaminated and lacking biodiversity.
This particular record is hardly Earth-shattering, which should make citizens wonder even more why the state would deem it so top-secret -- and what more important records might be quashed.
The attempt to withhold the list, when other states released their versions to the public, says much more about the attitude at IDEM than it does the actual open record. It's just another in a series of political moves:
-- IDEM hastened the permitting process for BP's air emissions.
-- IDEM officials refuse to fill the environmental liaison role.
-- Easterly insists the primary goal of IDEM is raising the average wage of Hoosiers.
-- Finally, the failure of the IDEM to realize that withholding public documents isn't just illegal, it also undermines the agency's credibility.
But you don't hear a word from the governor. After all, his minions at IDEM are doing his bidding.
Voters should remember this come November. Go to Original
As food becomes a global issue, the US looks at it as nothing but profit
Mater Dei High School wins vehicle mileage award and $10,000
April 13, 2008-PRNewswire. Mater Dei High School team poses with their #22 car, right, which is the grand prize winner, registering 2,843.4 miles per gallon at the 2008 Shell Eco-marathon Americas Saturday, April 12, 2008 at the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif. The team's #21 car, left, placed third in the event, which challenges students to design and build eco-friendly vehicles that travel the farthest distance using the least amount of fuel. Photo:PRNewsFoto/Shell
"Ladies and gentlemen, start your fuel-efficient engines" were the words that kicked off the 2008 Shell Eco-marathon(TM) Americas; and that's exactly what more than 300 students from Canada, Mexico, and the United States did today. Mater Dei High School of Evansville, Ind., set a new mileage record at the 2008 Shell Eco-marathon Americas, a challenge to design, build and test fuel-efficient prototype vehicles that travel the farthest distance using the least amount of fuel.
The team's combustion-engine prototype vehicle achieved an astonishing 2,843.4 miles per gallon, equivalent to 1,208.6 kilometers per liter. Despite wind gusts of up to 50 miles per hour and various teams' mechanical issues, competition was steep this year with three teams breaking the 2007 mileage record set by Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo.
"When we first arrived, I wasn't sure a small high school like Mater Dei could compete with all these elite colleges," said Justin Stute, Mater Dei High School team captain. "But our first run broke the record and then our second car did even better. That really motivated both of our teams to go all the way."
Mark Singer, global project manager for the Shell Eco-marathon said, "Students participating in this competition are the brains of the future, stretching the boundaries of fuel efficiency and providing solutions to the global energy challenge. Throughout the two-day competition, teams are constantly making improvements to their vehicles, exchanging ideas and inspiring one another to pay attention to their own energy footprint."
The 2008 Shell Eco-marathon Americas welcomed 32 teams from four high schools and 23 universities from Canada, Mexico and the U.S. The entries include 25 vehicles powered by combustion engines, four by fuel cell/hydrogen technology, one by diesel fuel, one by LPG (liquid petroleum gas) and two by solar power. Learn More
Global food crisis looms
April 13, 2008-by John Blair, valleywatch,net editor. Haiti, Egypt, the Philippines have all recently experienced huge increases in the cost of food which has lead to severe food shortages.
Several people have contacted Valley Watch recently alerting us to the increasingly severe global food crisis that is coming about as a result of diverting food to fuel for transportation as well as a response to some of the predictable reactions to the global climate crisis.
Food riots have occurred in both Haiti and Egypt and fear of hunger is spreading across the planet.
Across the board, the response of governments has been rooted in confusion as most seek to assure a continuation of economic policies that enrich the few while the masses are left to fight for scraps.
In America, which was once considered the world's bread basket, Congress and the executive have eagerly sought to lavish big subsidies on big farmers to grow less food and more "home grown energy" as they say.
This crisis is unlikely to resolve itself and will get worse.
Is it simply a matter of too many people on the earth or is it a question of moral and ethical distribution of wealth and resources?
This video is a report about the food situation and helps explain the reasons it is happening and what might be done to avert disaster.
Revolutionary Aptera can achieve 230+ MPG
April 12, 2008-New vehicle design that looks more like an airplane than a car, will soon hit the road and although it is pricey at a projected $30K, its mileage for a typical commute can be in excess of 500 MPG. Information in this story is from Aptera.com.
Five years ago, Aptera's founder Steve Fambro endeavored to design and build a passenger vehicle that was safe, comfortable, and more fuel-efficient than anything ever produced.
This aspiration, combined with his background in engineering, led him to an intensive study of aerodynamics, and composite aircraft construction. He hypothesized that a low-drag, aerodynamic body shape could be achieved without sacrificing comfort, drivability or safety.
What emerged, after much designing, conceptualizing, and constructing, was a prototype two-seat, three-wheeled vehicle. This first operating prototype achieved a stunning 230 miles per gallon, Building on this success, Steve expanded his Aptera team and created the Aptera Typ-1, which has been re-designed, re-engineered, and refined into a production ready vehicle. We are excited to announce that the Aptera Typ-1 is now available for reservations.
The Aptera was designed from the ground up as an electric vehicle, and later as an extended range electric vehicle. After building the proof-of-concept Mk-0, we hired the automotive design firm, 'eleven', to help us further develop the concept vehicle.
The 'eleven' team, led by Jason Hill and Nathan Armstrong, made great strides in the development of the Aptera's body styling, interior design, and structural engineering. Meanwhile, we refined the Aptera's shape to maximize efficiency using CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics), developed and built advanced suspension and drivetrain components, and integrated a strong yet lightweight composite shell.
The entire process has been developed in-house exclusively by Aptera for the Aptera Typ-1. Our structural elements have undergone countless revisions of FEA (Finite Element Analysis) to be lightweight, robust, and manufacturable.
IDEM refuses to make list of Indiana's "impaired" rivers and streams public
April 11, 2008-by Gitte Laasby, The Gary Post Tribune. "It's disappointing that Indiana is refusing to be transparent in developing its impaired waters list at this stage," said Lyman Welch, water quality program manager with the Alliance for the Great Lakes."
Indiana Department of Environmental Management refuses to release a list of Indiana rivers and streams it considers impaired, even though other states have released their lists and environmentalists argue the list is public record.
Individual states' 2008 Impaired Waters Lists were due to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency by April 1. But the Indiana Department of Environmental Management refuses to release Indiana's list until it has been approved by the EPA.
The list is a public document, said Tom Anderson, executive director of Save the Dunes Council.
Agency: Report is coming
"The intention of our Office of Water Quality is to provide the list when U.S. EPA final approves it," IDEM spokeswoman Amy Hartsock wrote in an e-mail.
She said the "list of impaired waterways currently posted on the IDEM Web site is the most recent version available to the public. The version sent to U.S. EPA by April 1 is undergoing review and will be finalized once U.S. EPA provides comment. Individuals, groups, and government officials have expressed an interest in the final list, and we will post the U.S. EPA-approved version on the IDEM Web site when it becomes available."
The list contains rivers, streams and lakes considered impaired for mercury, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), E. coli and lack of biodiversity. The state was met with resistance when it proposed taking the Grand Calumet River off the list, saying it has the necessary insects and fish.
The federal agency by Thursday still hadn't received Indiana's list from IDEM, according to EPA Region 5 spokeswoman Phillippa Cannon. (MORE) Go to Original
May 15, 2008-New report by the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy (ACEEE) released today shows huge energy saving through efficiency have already occurred and lots more is available. Photo © 2008 John Blair shows Light Emitting Diodes (LED) in use. LEDs consume a mere fraction of the energy of either incandescent or compact fluorescent bulbs in most applications today.
May 15, 2008-by John Cheves, in the Lexington Herald Leader. After the Herald-Leader asked about, a Web site run by the Kentucky Foundation, state officials acknowledged that some of its content crossed the line into marketing. A page promoting mountaintop removal mining claiming it is actually good for the environment and does very little damage, according to the site. Photo: © 2008 John Blair shows the "Paradise" power plant in Muhlenberg County, KY.
May 15, 2008-Ed Edelson in the Washington Post. Fine particles are known to cause cancer, heart disease, stroke and respiriatory problems like asthma. Now comes a new disease-blood clots in people's legs. Fine particles are formed when pollutants like sulfur dioxide from coal burning combine with oxygen to form a particle which is breathed deeply into human lungs.
May 14, 2008-John Blair owns a single share of Vectren stock just to get their annual report and occasionally attend their annual meeting. He did that today. Here is his story. Blair is pictured in a file photo on the Ohio River with Vectren in the background on the left. 
May 11, 2008-By Bill McKibben in the Los Angeles Times. The planet is nearing a tipping point on climate change, and it gets much worse, fast. We have, at best, a few years to short-circuit them -- to reverse course. Bill McKibben, a scholar in residence at Middlebury College and the author A longer version of this article appears at Tomdispatch.com.
May, 9, 2008-Science Daily. Globally, a total of some millions of tons per year is being stored today within the framework of CCS. But to live up to the hopes placed on CCS requires the storage of several billion tons. In other words, this involves gargantuan volumes. In fact, carbon dioxide would be the world’s largest transported good.
May, 9, 2008-By John Blair, valleywatch.net eidtor. Spendiing millions on national advertising to promote coal with generally false claims of cleanliness, the American Coalition for - Coal Electricity issued a press release yesterday complaining that Sierra Club and its "cohorts" were simply "clogging up the system" by suing numerous coal fired plant proposals to decrease mercury emissions.
May 9, 2008-By Gitte Laasby, Gary Post-Tribune. Asked whether Stuckey checked with legal counsel on the notice requirement, Easterly said, "I can't speak for what somebody else did." Ed. Note: Tom Easterly is the Commissioner, is he not accountable for the actions of his agency?
May 7, 2008-by Stephanie Steitzer, in the Louisville Courier Journal. Ed. Note: Kentucky is ga ga over coal and the problem with global warming has no brief in the Commonwealth as politicians from all ranks jump on the chance to spend taxpayer money on anything that can be called coal.
May 6, 2008-by Elizabeth Grossman on Salon.com. Arctic researchers are routinely recording a lot more than mercury. They are seeing synthetic chemicals such as the brominated flame retardants known as PBDE's (used in upholstery, textiles and plastics), as well as perfluorinated and chlorine compounds. And while long banned in many countries, lingering amounts of DDT and PCBs continue to turn up in people and animals in the Far North. Illustration: © 2008 John Blair.
May 2, 2008-by Michael Hawthorne, © Chicago Tribune. Mary Gade, based in Chicago, says Bush administration made her quit over Dow Chemical case. She said top lieutenants to Stephen Johnson, the national EPA administrator, repeatedly questioned her aggressive action against Dow.
April 30, 2008-by John Blair Valley Watch editor. Renewable energy has been our mantra for several decades at Valley Watch. This week, Orion Energy Group put about half of their planned 121 wind turbines online. The rest will be operational soon. Photo for valleywatch.net by Alice Wernicki
April 29, 2008-BBC News. A tree said to be the oldest on the planet - thought to be nearly 10,000 years old - has been found in Sweden. It took seed just after the last Ice Age.
April 28, 2008- By James Hansen, director of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Goddard Institute for Space Studies, but the perspectives here are his own. Hansen is also Adjunct Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia University’s Earth Institute. Photo from State of the Wild by Alexander Hafemann
April 28, 2008-Last month was the warmest March on land globally in the 129 history of record keeping according to NOAA's Satellite and Information Center released several days ago. Combined with ocean surface temperatures, march ranked second on record.
April 23, 2008-by John Blair, valleywatch.net editor. Barack Obama came to an enthusiastic crowd last night in Evansville, IN but left us wondering if he had any green in him at all. Photo © 2008 John Blair
April 22, 2008-by Gitte Laasby, The Gary Post Tribune. Ed. Note: IDEM has become nothing more than an economic development agency for Indiana, moving rapidly to issue permits without due vetting and now even to the point that they will not inform people of the biggest environmental issue of our time.
April 16, 2008- Spring is here and its colorful glory is evident in every direction. The Valley Watch garden has come alive. Photos © 2008 by John Blair, show clockwise from upper left: a violet growing close to the ground, redbud blooms, a small tulip, a prolific weed that looks like a miniature daisy, beautiful bluebells, and an azalea bud about to open.
April 15, 2008-Editorial, Gary Post Tribune. Ed. Note: Gary is in extreme northwest Indiana but the same things this editorial point out are happening in SW indiana as well. Public participation is squelched, and citizens are treated as the enemy. It's enough to make you scream.
© 2008 NaturalNews.com
April 13, 2008-PRNewswire. Mater Dei High School team poses with their #22 car, right, which is the grand prize winner, registering 2,843.4 miles per gallon at the 2008 Shell Eco-marathon Americas Saturday, April 12, 2008 at the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif. The team's #21 car, left, placed third in the event, which challenges students to design and build eco-friendly vehicles that travel the farthest distance using the least amount of fuel. Photo:PRNewsFoto/Shell
April 13, 2008-by John Blair, valleywatch,net editor. Haiti, Egypt, the Philippines have all recently experienced huge increases in the cost of food which has lead to severe food shortages. 
April 12, 2008-New vehicle design that looks more like an airplane than a car, will soon hit the road and although it is pricey at a projected $30K, its mileage for a typical commute can be in excess of 500 MPG. Information in this story is from Aptera.com.
